This is the archive, folks. The current stuff is on the main page.

Scoop Point

31 July 06 | 15:15 | Posted by:

I had never heard of Focus Features before watching Lost in Translation, but this weekend I came to an important realization: Focus was created for the express purpose of preventing me from completely hating Hollywood and the film industry in general. More so than Pixar, even. I've developed an almost Pavlovian response when the Focus logo appears before a movie trailer: I actually pay attention to the contents of the trailer. And I invariably find myself thinking, "Hey, that looks really good," when the trailer ends.

Likewise with Focus movies themselves: not only do I not feel slightly less intelligent after watching them as happens with most movies these days -- I actually leave the theatre happy. Glad to have spent the ten bucks, even. It's a miracle of Hollywood.

This weekend's Focus movie du jour was Scoop, which demonstrated Woody Allen's latest obsession: Scarlett Johansson having ill-advised relationships with wealthy British men. It was a perfectly enjoyable movie for several reasons, not least of which was the improbable sight of Johansson turning into a younger (and vastly more attractive) mirror of Allen's neuroses. What really made Scoop so enjoyable, however, was the fact that it's essentially the alternate reality version of last year's Match Point. I imagine Scoop came into being as Allen was watching the rough cut of Match Point and starting freaking out in his quietly neurotic way, the realization dawning that oh dear this movie is so dark and serious and not at all like what most people expect from him. So he rewrote the movie as a screwball comedy.

Sorry. I know you guys get confused and feel I'm "off message" if I fail to couch everything in terms of videogames, so let me restate in the visual language of nerds:

category: media | forums | 19 comments | §

Symphony of the Lite

27 July 06 | 22:58 | Posted by:

I spent the whole stupid day surfing the Internet with Opera on a DS Lite. That has borne two important results: (1) I hate the Internet now more than ever, and (2) I've written about it. Surfing on Opera, I mean. My hatred of the Internet is the subtext of everything I write.

I do believe that may be my first ever not-work-safe article, ever. That's right, boobies. So please Digg it so it will be popular and I can keep my job... at least, until I'm driven away by this thing:

That's the view from the office window right across from my desk -- this ten-story tower of anger features a gas-powered piston that it slams into the ground every two seconds for hours at a time with both explosive noise and enough force to make our building tremble. It's sort of annoying. In fact, the only thing more annoying is the fact that everyone in the office screams about how annoying it is the minute it starts, and continues for up to an hour after it's finished. It's like they're all offended that there's actually something more shrill and irritating than themselves and do their very best to one-up it. Mission accomplished, guys. You can knock it off, now.

category: games | forums | 28 comments | §

Pasta participle

26 July 06 | 16:56 | Posted by:

Kohler has a frightening ability to find amazingly obscure and/or valuable videogames when he hits the local Goodwills. Me, not so much. Usually I just find a lot of bad PS2 wrestling games or the odd, lonely copy of SNES Jeopardy! or something. To date, this copy of LucasArts' Outlaws is the best I've managed.

The only redeeming factor: if you look closely, you'll notice it's the Italian version. I'm pretty sure there's a spaghetti western joke in there somewhere, but I can't seem to put my finger on it.

Sorry. Since yesterday's crappy cellphone picture went over so well (apparently 4CR is frequented by thousands of people with a burning compulsion to click links) I figured I'd balance things out with a crappy cell phone picture destined to bomb. Completely.

Also, it appears China is attempting to bring the plot of G.I. Joe: The Movie into real life.

category: games | forums | sixteen comments | §

Contact is pretty much what I expected

25 July 06 | 06:50 | Posted by:

Which is a good thing, but still....

Have you no shame, Mr. Hulett? Have you at last no shame?

(Sorry about the crappy photo quality -- all I had on me at the time was my cell phone.)

Edit: Given the general sense of "Wow I've never heard of this but suddenly I am interested!" that seems to be accompanying links to this image, may I recommend you learn all about the game with the world's greatest Contact preview?

category: games | forums | 38 comments | §

Hot side hot, cool side cool

24 July 06 | 17:02 | Posted by:

Man, I wasn't looking forward to this week at all. Temperatures in the city were close to 100F the other day, with two consecutive days of record highs, and that is the sort of thing that makes me seriously cranky. San Francisco plus hot weather equals GROSS. All our hippies and homeless people smell bad enough at normal temperatures; when it gets above 80 the only real description that fits is "gagsome."

But then the Contact reviewable arrived and all I could see was rainbows and sugar pixies. I'm pretty sure this means that life is beautiful and not that I'm hallicinating or anything.

EGM's reviews editor tells me that my scores for both Ultimate Ghosts 'N' Goblins and Deep Labyrinth were way, way off the other reviewers' marks. And I have a sneaking suspicion that I'll have the highest rating for Contact by a fair margin. It is totally great to know that I'm making a mockery of the concept of scoring game reviews without even trying.

category: games | forums | 18 comments | §

Vrooom

22 July 06 | 00:12 | Posted by:

category: blog | forums | ten comments | §

Mellllting

21 July 06 | 00:08 | Posted by:

This heatwave is insane. I think we're going to hit 80 today. For San Francisco in the summer that's pretty intense. It's as though Al Gore is flying overhead, causing each and every one of us to sizzle under his baleful, accusatory glare. I take public transportation, Al! I use rechargeable batteries! I don't have air conditioning! I love my planet! So please, stop making me wear short sleeves. I fear sunlight.
I love the fact that the TransFormers/Go-Bot rivalry is still a part of America's collective unconscious. Lopsided though the rivalry may be. I mean, Go-Bots were totally lame.
I have registered the URL retronauts.com, which leads you to my slowly-expanding collection of retrospective blogs and will probably get itself more of a workout than the sadly neglected GameSpite domain. Also, while I enjoy covering individual titles via Retronauts, the topical ones (such as the Konami Code entry) are much more entertaining. I am, however, far too burnt out to come up with my own ideas, so feel free to suggest others.
Finally, to reconfirm: yes, the map for Legacy of the Wizard is completely ridiculous.

Post-script: YES. Nice to see the power-ups in action... those weren't there at E3.

Post-script EX PLUS: I've finally posted previews of Nintendo's bit Generations imports: Boundish, Dialhex and dotstream. I have mixed feelings on these; on one hand, they totally appeal to my snobbish sense of retro-aesthetics; on the other, twenty bucks apiece is an awful lot for what should really be freeware. Nice packaging, though.

I was hoping there would be some video to go along with the previews, but unfortunately all we have is this week's 1UP Show clip. Nothing against the 1UP Show, mind you, but I hate being on video... especially seeing as I'd barely spent any time with the games at the time of filming. Alas, I tried to take a principled stand to spare everyone the indigity, but they were having none of it. So, my apologies as always.

category: blog | forums | 34 comments | §

BUH HUH GAME JOURNALISM

18 July 06 | 18:53 | Posted by:

There has been an awful lot of navel-gazing about the very silly vocation which is often referred to (mistakenly) as "videogame journalism." GameDaily seems to be leading the way, having stumbled upon the realization that it's a shortcut to instant traffic: whine about the gaming press and the gaming press will whine right back with a big ol' link, dragging readers unwittingly (and often unwillingly) into our ugly little world of PR handshakes and money hats. But their little traffic trick does provide a handy case-in-point for the whole issue -- people think the gaming press sucks because the gaming press won't stop talking about itself. Seriously, peer group! Here is what you need to do:

Go watch "Capote."
Observe Truman Capote's behavior throughout the film, and the fact that he talks about nothing but himself, and the fact that he is very tiresome.
Apply Bloom's taxonomic principle of synthesis re: your own behavior.
????
Profit.

I'll leave it to you sort out step 4 on your own. But hurry, audiences are growing restless.

Me, my biggest complaint about game "journalism" is that it isn't particularly creative. It's writing about things other people have created. And while that's all well and good and sometimes perfectly enjoyable, I think my brain is beginning to chafe at the prospect of spending my life writing about the work of others and never doing anything original myself. This is usually where trouble begins, so brace yourselves.

Of course, I've gone and created my very first Wikipedia page -- writing about someone else's work in someone else's communal encyclopedia. This is not what you would call "progress." I'd like to blame Bryan Lee O'Malley, but I guess I should face facts and accept that it is actually my own stupid fault. Is it so wrong that I take umbrage at the complete lack of Demonhead coverage, well, pretty much anywhere? If loving justice is wrong, etc. etc.

Just kidding about the moneyhats, by the way. But man, my bank account wishes I weren't.

category: blog | forums | 28 comments | §

Redactyl

17 July 06 | 19:22 | Posted by:

Hey, guys, sorry about that ZX review-ish thing I posted the other day. It could well be the worst thing I've ever written. I was kind of hoping that slapping together a completely irreponsible bit of free-association would jumpstart my enthusiasm for writing about videogames in general, but no luck. Aside from self-indulgent forays into things forgotten, game writing still seems about as appealing as being suffocated to death by having a dead fish stuffed down my throat, and I've managed to embarrass myself. Oops.

Here is a summary, in far briefer and more informative terms: best Mega Man game in ages, reminiscent in many ways of Legends' structure and overall dynamic, but with Zero's gameplay and classic Mega Man's spirit. Hooray for its excellent balance, and you are personally accountable for the fact that this game arrived 15 years too late. The end.

On the plus side, my growing professional ennui should find a lovely outlet if I ever manage to knock the rust off my drawing hand and get back into comicking. To that end, I've put together a new presentation format for Gamespite. I have plans.

Of course, plans aren't worth much without the discipline to give them life, so I doubt anything will ever come of it all. But what would life be without fruitless ambitions?

category: blog | forums | 20 comments | §

U, 2, can sound alike

14 July 06 | 20:00 | Posted by:

Some jerk broke into my girlfriend's garage and swiped her MP3 player and cassette adapter from her car, which means we've been forced to listen to the radio when driving around lately. It's been a learning experience for me. The big revelation: everyone sounds like U2 now. At first I was confused by the presence of all these U2 songs I'd never heard before, but slowly I began to realize that the band isn't nearly as prolific as I had originally suspected. Instead, they're simply being... sincerely flattered. Coldplay, Keane and Rock Kills Kid have all apparently kidnapped Flood and forced him to engineer their albums at gunpoint. It would be one thing if it were just lead singers trying (badly) to sound like Bono, but it's also guitarists reverbing (badly) like The Edge and rhythm sections playing exactly like Clayton and Mullen (albeit, uh, badly).

Somewhere, the ghost of Michael Hutchence is smiling.

OH WELL. So anyway, I finished up Mega Man ZX and wrote a, uh, review? I guess? Maybe not a review so much as the titular verbal spew. They make me write all concisely and professionally at work so if I want to retain my ability to be self-indulgent and boring I have to work hard to stay in practice. I'd say "enjoy," but that's not really the point. So... come share my suffering. Yeah.

category: media | forums | 44 comments | §

We could be heroes

12 July 06 | 17:02 | Posted by:

Hey, it looks like my Legend of Heroes II review has finally been posted (after laying dormant for a few weeks because I'm a big dope). I probably spent more time on this particular review than the game really deserved, but it was a matter of necessity -- LoH2 is so generic, so utterly competent-yet-unremarkable that I had trouble coming up with 120 words for the EGM cross-review.

Thus, I had no choice but to create a cartoon review to spare myself the excruciating challenge of coming up with another 500 words about it. And even then, I had to embellish it by concocting a slightly creepy reality in which Valkyrie and Reiko Nagase are living in a rather suspect domestic situation. (Sorry the art is subpar, I'm rusty.)

I tried to use a Bandai character in there instead of just two Namco characters (the better to represent the corporation with) but was stymied by the fact that Bandai hasn't created an original character since "Monster Party."

category: games | forums | eleven comments | §

Big dumb action movies I have loved

12 July 06 | 08:58 | Posted by:

Or at least liked. Subtext: by "liked" I also mean "were way better than Dead Man's Chest." This is a direct response to a sort of challenge posted in the previous comment thread. Well, OK, it was actually just a simple question of what the last action movie I actually enjoyed was, but I picked up on the subtext: "Alright, jerk, if you're going to be all condescending we'll be more than happy to get our verbal abuse from a site that offers better reads and more interesting content." So here, look. I can be just as lowbrow as anyone.

In no particular order: the first... uh, eight dumb but enjoyable action movies that popped into my mind as I drafted this.

Aliens
There's a gigantic gap in quality between the first Alien and its sequels, but Aliens is miles beyond the others, and not at all bad for a Reagen-era "kill 'em all" flick. (Besides the Director's Cut, which spoils all the suspense and ruins all the pacing. Nice one, Cameron.) The marines are just army movie clichés in space, but Sigourney Weaver is so completely convincing as Ellen Ripley that it doesn't actually matter. P.S. in my perfect world, the other sequels never happened.

X-Men II
Sure, it was about leather-clad people with physics-defying abilities. But it was surprisingly well-written once you got over the suspension of disbelief hump.

Spider-man II
I'm not quite convinced that radical genetic mutations will simply go away on their own if you give self-doubt a foothold in your brain. Still, despite the fact that half the movie was spent ripping off Superman II, Sam Raimi did the impossible and turned Dr. Octopus into a completely great character. But you know, if I were Peter Parker, I would have forgotten about Mary Jane and made a move on the landlord's daughter. Sure, she was gawky and weird, but she could bake delicious-looking cakes.

Mission: Impossible
Before Tom Cruise was a psychotic advocate of scientology, the world admired him. (Mainly for his beautifully manicured teeth.) I'd probably hate this movie if I had any affection for the original M:I television series, seeing as the film craps all over the characters at every turn. Since I don't, I'm even willing to forgive its mid-'90s "INTERNETS ARE MAGICAL" plot twists. Truth be told, I think the main reason I enjoy it is because I had been in Prague a few weeks before the movie came out, and it hit that "OMG I WAS JUST THERE" spot in my brain.

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Raiders of the Lost Ark was awesome, and Temple of Doom was just plain stupid. The Last Crusade was somewhere in between, but it had the good grace to be fun. Which brings us to an important point: if you're going to make a dumb movie, have a good sense of humor about it and we'll forgive you.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith
This movie would have been mildly dumb instead of completely stupid if only the ending hadn't been such a cop-out. Not that it matters. The only reason to watch this movie is to enjoy the spectacle of beautiful people shooting at each other to the accompaniment of a great soundtrack.

Kung-Fu Hustle
Stephen Chow basically has one movie that he keeps making over and over again, and every time it becomes a little more polished and hilarious. Kung-Fu Hustle is basically a classic Warner Bros. cartoon filmed with live Chinese actors, and basically stands as a monument to how good Kill Bill might have been if it hadn't been so completely horrible.

Revenge of the Sith
There's nothing redeeming about this movie whatsoever, but I was programmed by nearly 30 years of Star Wars saturation to enjoy it. And I did! Plus, it was still better than Dead Man's Chest.

The end.

Also, I'm told that I sort of indirectly made it into Newsweek. Maybe next time it'll be about something I'm not sick to death of. (Edit: Apparently the online version links directly to my 1UP blog. Victory? I guess?)

category: media | forums | 29 comments | §

Dead Man's Worst

10 July 06 | 10:40 | Posted by:

"Pirates of the Caribbean II" was, as expected, seriously terrible. Worse than I expected, actually, and that's despite my desperate attempts to enjoy it. Ticket prices these days are far too high to waste money on movies you hate, you see, so I do my best to make the most of everything I see. But some things are too awful for even the best of intentions to salvage. The occasional moments of humor and the interesting monster designs couldn't offset the unrelenting dumbness on display. I didn't really enjoy the first movie, but the sequel gave me one of those Xenogears/Xenosaga moments where I realized that the original, for all its flaws, could have been so much worse.

Sometime last week, I read an article that discussed why modern CDs sound so awful: they're being engineered for loudness, so the dynamic range of older recordings has been abandoned in favor of a constant torrent of full-throttle sound. The result is that there are no moments of quietness to give your ears a break, just non-stop forceful excitement. This has the net effect of making the sound incredibly boring due to its sheer monotony. "Dead Man's Chest" is the cinematic equivalent of that -- it's always blaring at maximum volume, so to speak, making it the most tedious action movie I can ever recall having watched. By the time the crew headed into the swamp to sort out what to do about Jack Sparrow, I was close to tears at the thought of the 30-45 minutes of drudgery that this new sidequest would require. Needless to say, I've never been so happy to see a cliffhanger ending.

At the other end of the quality spectrum, Mega Man ZX and Loco Roco are pretty much pure blissfull happiness. Loco Roco is probably, technically speaking, more blissful and happy than ZX, but it's ZX (pronounced "zechs," like "sex" for you filthy-minded types who live for mnemonics) that has me sneaking away from my current review obligations to put in a few more minutes of game time whenever I can.

Capcom has created its very own grand unifying theory of Mega Man games here, a title that pulls together the best parts of the classic series (the boss-derived power-ups are the most streamlined and practical they've been since MM2), the X games (the loving nod to the original MMX is enough to bring a tear to your eye), the Zero series (for obvious reasons) and even Legends (with its open-ended world design built of interconnected stages focused around a central hub city area). That does leave Battle Network out in the cold, but tough luck.

The most impressive thing about ZX is that it has the aesthetics and play control of the Zero games -- which have always been exceptional -- but tones the difficulty down slightly to something that actually feels balanced. (Masochists take heart: there's an unlockable Hard mode which will have you reaching for your GameShark.) And despite its Metroidvania-esque feel there's no shortage of challenge, including some tricky platform jumping that's just as tough in reverse. And here you thought it couldn't be done.

Anyway, unless the finale turns out to be mind-blowing, ZX won't become my favorite Mega Man game. But it's definitely jockeying for a top-five slot. Will it convince me to forgive and forget Mega Man X6? Mmmm... nah. Nothing is that good.

Edit: Heidi MacDonald reams Pirates with far more panache than I could bother to muster.

category: games | forums | 31 comments | §

I surrender

06 July 06 | 13:16 | Posted by:

Man, no one told me that Mega Man ZX was a friggin' Metroidvania. How am I supposed to resist this? It purges the retardedly high difficulty level of the Zero series, ups the graphics, adds improved cinematics, then takes the nascent open-ended promise of the first Zero and runs with it. Game of the year! Well, maybe month. Week. Something.

Anyway, it's been added to the list.

On a tangential note, the new copy of EGM has arrived in the office, featuring what could be the greatest thing I've ever done: a retro-Afterthoughts with Koji Igarashi about Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. After this and E3 and my interview with him in a few weeks at Comic-Con, the man is going to totally start barfing at the mere sight of me. But at least it makes for good reading.

Equally tangential, but far sadder: my DS Lite is not working very well at the moment. Games that make use of the face buttons -- particularly the B button -- cause the system to power off abruptly for no clear reason. I'm draining the battery right now and have cleaned the contacts, which will hopefully solve the problem. Has anyone else heard of this particular problem? Any advice? (I'd do the warranty thing but I doubt NoA is going to be interested in servicing a Japanese system....)

category: games | forums | 31 comments | §

Sketchblog -- July 5

05 July 06 | 18:10 | Posted by:

Truth be told, I really hate pirates -- they're the most insipid form of "instant comedy" this side of, say, monkeys. (Needless to say, "Dead Man's Chest" is going to be so very bad.) Maybe I'd like them better if they provided a useful public service, like this Pyre-ate: